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Lady Bee’s 2012 Holiday Gift Guide: The Best of Down Goes Brown

A quasi-regular feature for the month of December in which Lady Bee provides you with gift ideas you won’t find in the Williams-Sonoma catalog.

If you love NHL hockey, and you have a sense of humour (seems required these days if you subscribe to the former), then chances are you are quite familiar with the excellent hockey blog Down Goes Brown. Brown, or Down, or…well, anyway, his parents and spouse know him as Sean McIndoe. He’s pulled together a compilation of his best work on the blog in The Best of Down Goes Brown, which was released this fall. I picked it up for my Kobo to read on the plane for my most recent trip out west last month, and had to choke back more than a few LOLs to prevent disturbing the other travellers. It contains many of his classic posts, including my all-time personal favourite (as detailed on the cover) “The NHL’s Top-Secret Flow Chart for Handing Out Suspensions”.

McIndoe’s approach to humour is fairly consistent: the “we stumbled upon this top secret memo…” is a familiar refrain. But it manages to stay clever every time, without resorting to being offensive or profane (not that I don’t love the sailor mouth, but it’s nice to come across a funny book about the NHL that I can easily give my father-in-law. You know, if he cared about books…)

If you’re unfamiliar with his work, a quick glance at his blog or a preview of his book will show you right away that McIndoe has a deep appreciation of NHL history, an extensive knowledge of the league, and low self-esteem for his continued allegiance to the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Now before you say “Now Bee, why would I want to pay for something that I can easily get for free on Brown’s blog?”, consider the following:

Remember: this is a gift guide. There are people out there who love humour about the NHL, but still prefer hearing the crack of a book’s spine as opposed to reading on a screen.

It contains several chapters of brand new Down Goes Brown goodness you won’t find anywhere else.

Shut up and support Sean McIndoe already so he can put his kid through university. He gives you this stuff for free and asks nothing in return.

The NHL is jerks, but The Best of Down Goes Brown will not let you down and will likely provide your loved one with more entertainment than that cancelled Winter Classic would have. Ask for it at your local bookstore or download it from Kobo (they currently have it listed at $11.99. Sweet!) or the usual e-book providers.